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Boris Johnson would shore up Tory vote as leader: poll

May 17th, 2019 James Randerson

Boris Johnson is the only prospective Tory leadership candidate capable of holding together the coalition of voters who backed the U.K.’s ruling Conservative Party at the last election, according to an exclusive POLITICO-Hanbury poll.

The results suggest that of six leading Tory figures, all except the former foreign secretary would lose the party votes compared with the 2017 general election if they became leader.

Johnson, a leading Brexiteer, does particularly well among respondents who say they plan to vote for Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party in the upcoming European Parliament election — but he is also very unpopular with people who voted Remain in the 2016 Brexit referendum.

The results come a day after Theresa May agreed, under pressure from her backbenchers, to set a timetable for her departure. Meanwhile Johnson — long assumed to have designs on the Tory leadership — indicated that he would stand when the prime minister eventually steps down. The leading Brexiteer told a business event in Manchester, “Of course I’m going to go for it.”

The results of the national poll, which was carried out between May 10 and May 13, suggest the Tories face a catastrophic result in the European election next week. Respondents placed them fourth with just 13 percent of the vote.

Leading the poll was the Brexit Party on 30 percent, with Labour on 25 percent, Lib Dems on 14 percent, Change UK on 6 percent and the Green Party on 6 percent. Farage’s former party, UKIP, which won the last European election with 27 percent of the vote in the U.K., has collapsed to just 3 percent, according to the poll.

Even more concerning for the Conservatives though is that none of the leading candidates to replace May look capable of winning mass appeal with voters across the Leave-Remain spectrum. Asked whether each of the six potential candidates would make respondents more or less likely to support the Tories, all were rejected overall by margins ranging from -17 percent (the difference between “more likely” and “less likely” responses) and -25 percent.

When it comes to the less ambitious goal of maintaining the backing of Tory voters at the last general election, only Johnson achieved a positive score (2 percent), suggesting that only he would be capable of holding that electoral coalition together.

Fellow Brexiteers Michael Gove, the environment secretary, and Dominic Raab, the former Brexit secretary, put off more of the 2017 Tory voters than they attracted, scoring -13 percent and -11 percent, respectively.

Three Cabinet ministers who backed Remain in the referendum — and would be likely to throw their hat into the ring — were also unpopular with Tory voters. Work and Pensions Secretary Amber Rudd scored -15 percent, Home Secretary Sajid Javid achieved -8 percent and Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt polled -9 percent.

The results also indicate how divisive a figure Johnson is among the wider electorate though. He scored +13 percent among Brexit Party voters, indicating that he would be able to staunch the hemorrhaging of Tory support to the new party. But the equivalent figure among people who voted Remain in the referendum is -27 percent, suggesting he would repel them in droves. Only Gove, a fellow leading light in the Leave campaign, did worse with those voters — with -30 percent.

Of concern for both main parties will be that the results suggest support for the new Brexit and Change UK parties amounts to more than a one-off protest vote for many of their prospective voters.

Forty-six percent of Brexit Party supporters said Farage would keep their support at the next general election, while 52 percent of Change UK supporters said the same. And the results suggest that the parties’ appeal would not be diminished much by the U.K. finally leaving the EU. Seventy percent of Brexit Party supporters said they were likely to continue supporting the party even after Brexit happens, while 77 percent of Change UK supporters said the same.

The results also give backing to those in the Labour party pushing for its leader Jeremy Corbyn to proclaim unambiguous support for a second Brexit referendum. Asked what impact that would have, 57 percent of people who voted for Labour in 2017 said it would make them more likely to back the party, while 20 percent said it would make them less likely. And the poll suggests it would also help Labour pick up Lib Dem votes too, with 38 percent of that party’s supporters saying it would make them more likely to vote Labour versus 26 percent who said it would make them less likely.